OV certificates, unlike DV certificates, ensures that an organisation owns the website. This involves a validation team working round the clock to ensure the company has been formally registered with business registries. With an OV certificate, users that click on the certificate details from the padlock can see the company name listed on the certificate itself. This gives greater assurance to customers who visits your website.

2. OV certificates provide a higher warranty value

In an unlikely situation where personal data theft has occurred or when an SSL certificate fails to encrypt data, Certificate Authorities (CA) will look to provide a warranty value in which you can get compensated. These days, OV certificates warranty range from $1 – 1.5 million whereas DV certificates warranty pay out a maximum of only up to $10,000.

3. SAN/Multi-Domain versions are not available for DV

There are times where for better certificate management, you’d like to list all domains of yours in one certificate. OV certificates allow just that with DigiCert allowing up to 25 Subject Alternative Name (SANs) to be listed in one digital certificate. Furthermore, DigiCert has unlimited server license that allows a user to use its certificate on an unlimited number of servers at no additional cost. In contrary with DV certificates, there are no such options.

4. DV Certificates may not be compatible with older browsers capable of only weak 40 or 50-bit encryption

In the 1990s, the SGC (Server Gated Cryptography) was introduced in the United States federal legislation as restrictions on the export of strong cryptography outside of US. Web browser vendors such as Microsoft and Netscape were affected and back then, their browsers could only support up to 40-bits. These days, there are a handful of browsers with these old specifications and the use of DV certificates would not be compatible. With OV certificates, however, they would automatically step up to secure with 128-bit or 256-bit encryption. OV certificates thus ensure better compatibility across all browser types.

To sum it up: Comparison between DV, OV & EV

Features

DV

OV

EV

Display Green Padlock and https:// protocol

Yes

Yes

Yes

Display Green Bar with company name and location of business

No

No

Yes

Organisation validated by third-party Certificate Authority (CA)

No

Yes

Yes

SAN/Multi-Domain Available

No

Yes

Yes

SGC compatibility

No

Yes

Yes

Warranty Value

$10,000 – $250,000

$1 – 1.5 million

$1 – 1.5million

So is OV certificates still worth the money? We’d say it is.

About Us

Cyber Secure Asia is a partner of DigiCert in South East Asia, providing SSL certificate, Code Signing, Document Signing and SecureWifi certificate solutions.